Mike Canales close to being named Tennessee’s quarterbacks coach

Very interesting point on Canales and Philip Rivers from Fox Sports Knoxville:

"This will be the part everyone uses to defend the hire, but it might help to know some things first. Canales was at NC State from 2001-2002 and coached Rivers at that time. However, Rivers had yet to really break out. When Canales left, Rivers was fifth in ACC passing efficiency and adjusted passing yards per attempt. He was second in touchdowns (20), but also second in interceptions (10)."

"After Canales left, Philip Rivers became PHILIP RIVERS!. Rivers led the ACC in basically every single passing stat after his coach’s departure. There are two ways of looking at this: either Canales coached him to that level of potential, or Canales was holding him back. Really, only Rivers and NC State staff know. One would hope it’s the former."

On Canales and other QBs:

"Canales dipped from USF right as they became an FBS school, so we don’t have much useful there. We’ve already mentioned Rivers at NC State. Here’s a list of the quarterbacks he directly coached at Arizona, USF, and North Texas: Richard Kovalchek (Arizona), Willie Tuitama (Arizona), BJ Daniels (USF), Derek Thompson (North Texas), Andrew McNulty (North Texas)."

"Ever heard of any of those five guys? No? Well, you’re in luck – you didn’t have to watch BJ Daniels play."

"What’s brutal for Canales is nearly every team’s passing game trending upwards after he left. Tuitama completed just 56.6% of his passes under Canales, but 63.5% after his departure, including leading the then-Pac-10 in touchdowns the year after Canales left. Daniels was never good, but he went from completing 53.7% of his passes under Canales to 58.1% in the years following. North Texas’s passing offenses ranked 80th or worse in efficiency in five of Canales’ six years, bottoming out at 126th in 2015."

On addition of Canales to our staff:

"As with Charlton Warren, I talked to my friend Adam McClintock at CFB Matrix about a potential Canales hire. Few in football are better at creating realistic expectations for coaching hires/fires based on performance to talent level. The results I got back from McClintock are really ugly: 'I have Mike as a D- guy. His job results haven't been anything worthy of a job like Tennessee.'"

He went on to mention that there is no correlation to Canales and developing talent. Specifically stating that his most talented team was the 2009 USF Bulls and he vastly underperformed.
 
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Sucks the DB hire was a good hire. His RBs at Utah State did fairly well, but if he is that good as a QB coach why wasn't he coaching QBs there. I can't get too down on Butch with the AD situation. I can still root for him and our team though.
 
Very interesting point on Canales and Philip Rivers from Fox Sports Knoxville:

"This will be the part everyone uses to defend the hire, but it might help to know some things first. Canales was at NC State from 2001-2002 and coached Rivers at that time. However, Rivers had yet to really break out. When Canales left, Rivers was fifth in ACC passing efficiency and adjusted passing yards per attempt. He was second in touchdowns (20), but also second in interceptions (10)."

"After Canales left, Philip Rivers became PHILIP RIVERS!. Rivers led the ACC in basically every single passing stat after his coach’s departure. There are two ways of looking at this: either Canales coached him to that level of potential, or Canales was holding him back. Really, only Rivers and NC State staff know. One would hope it’s the former."

On Canales and other QBs:

"Canales dipped from USF right as they became an FBS school, so we don’t have much useful there. We’ve already mentioned Rivers at NC State. Here’s a list of the quarterbacks he directly coached at Arizona, USF, and North Texas: Richard Kovalchek (Arizona), Willie Tuitama (Arizona), BJ Daniels (USF), Derek Thompson (North Texas), Andrew McNulty (North Texas)."

"Ever heard of any of those five guys? No? Well, you’re in luck – you didn’t have to watch BJ Daniels play."

"What’s brutal for Canales is nearly every team’s passing game trending upwards after he left. Tuitama completed just 56.6% of his passes under Canales, but 63.5% after his departure, including leading the then-Pac-10 in touchdowns the year after Canales left. Daniels was never good, but he went from completing 53.7% of his passes under Canales to 58.1% in the years following. North Texas’s passing offenses ranked 80th or worse in efficiency in five of Canales’ six years, bottoming out at 126th in 2015."

On addition of Canales to our staff:

"As with Charlton Warren, I talked to my friend Adam McClintock at CFB Matrix about a potential Canales hire. Few in football are better at creating realistic expectations for coaching hires/fires based on performance to talent level. The results I got back from McClintock are really ugly: 'I have Mike as a D- guy. His job results haven't been anything worthy of a job like Tennessee.'"

He went on to mention that there is no correlation to Canales and developing talent. Specifically stating that his most talented team was the 2009 USF Bulls and he vastly underperformed.

Its a joke hire
 
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Butch wanted a yes man and thats what he got

That's the feeling im getting too. A Good coach know's how to put the right pieces around him to be succsessful. As bad as I hate to admit it, Im slowly losing confidence in Butch & his decision making in critical positions like this. IMO This is another one of those moves/hires by Butch that leaves me scratching my head!

Im just really hoping that coach Canales lifetime coaching stats, have been hoobled some what by not having the best of talent to work with through the years. Hopefully coach Canales & coach Scott is the right pieces on the board for us to manuever around and win the SEC east! I really hope im way wrong! Ill gladly eat some well done Crow come December! Only time will tell about the direction of our QBs & Offense this fall. Go Big 🍊!
 
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Other than recruiting, I don't see the advantage of a QB coach with NFL experience...specially in this type of system, which isn't the NFL norm. Give me an experienced college hand anyday.

Only advantage in recruiting I could see would be pointing to the fact that they had actually made it to the NFL and coached at the highest level.

Agree with the systems not meshing well, especially with Weinke. Dorsey made a lot more sense from that aspect since Carolina runs some option with Cam.

At the end of it they are all teaching the same basics on throwing a ball and reading a defense though.

Canales won't be a make or break hire for Jones, he sure doesn't seem to have any inclination to step outside his comfort zone to add fresh perspective to the offense though.
 
All I can add is that if the reaction from VOLNATION is any indication this guy is gonna be AWESOME!!!!!
WHY YOU ASK: VOLNATION said Debord sucks, underwhelming hire. Hmmmmm, best offense numbers ever! VOLNATION said Shoop would bring it! Hmmmmm, one of the worst defenses EVER! SO that means Cannales is gonna train up Dormady to a Heisman!!!! 2017 book it!
 
Again I see someone else post about changing to the blocking scheme. What is wrong with the zone scheme we run on most plays? We do throw some gap and man in depending on what the play requires but we use a lot of zone. The zone blocking we use is used by almost all football teams consistently. Is the issue the scheme or the players have not been man enough these last 4 years enough to engage and hold the blocks? Jones and Hall seem to do well with it. People keep saying it is the scheme and then do not say what is wrong with the actual scheme. I have to assume it's because they don't know what schemes we use and the term scheme is so easy to throw around because we don't have a play by play log identifying stats when in zone, man, or gap blocking.

Some sammy-sausage head tried to tell me the other day on this site that it was a passing scheme which is just stupid(no nice words for that level of ignorance). Spread offenses use this scheme to have a smashmouth rushing attack which we managed to put up the 5.2 average rushing yards with last year. Only one player on the team failed to get solid averages rushing and that was Hurd.

I was referring to the scheme in reference to not expecting it to change if Jones dumps Mahoney and promotes Wells, not that I think the scheme should change. As you said, everyone is running some variation of zone blocking nowadays except GA Tech.

I don't know how much has to do with the player and how much has to do with the S&C program but these guys seem to have a particularly difficult time driving defenders back once the snap is made.

Hall and Jones have some nasty streaks to them which I think helps on the inside but the tackles drive me nuts with their footwork.

Thomas always seems to be lunging as opposed to blocking and that stems from improper footwork as much as anything IMO. I just think the fundamentals of starting with a good base and moving their feet is kind of shoddy, especially outside and it's not just with Thomas.
 
Very interesting point on Canales and Philip Rivers from Fox Sports Knoxville:

"This will be the part everyone uses to defend the hire, but it might help to know some things first. Canales was at NC State from 2001-2002 and coached Rivers at that time. However, Rivers had yet to really break out. When Canales left, Rivers was fifth in ACC passing efficiency and adjusted passing yards per attempt. He was second in touchdowns (20), but also second in interceptions (10)."

"After Canales left, Philip Rivers became PHILIP RIVERS!. Rivers led the ACC in basically every single passing stat after his coach’s departure. There are two ways of looking at this: either Canales coached him to that level of potential, or Canales was holding him back. Really, only Rivers and NC State staff know. One would hope it’s the former."

On Canales and other QBs:

"Canales dipped from USF right as they became an FBS school, so we don’t have much useful there. We’ve already mentioned Rivers at NC State. Here’s a list of the quarterbacks he directly coached at Arizona, USF, and North Texas: Richard Kovalchek (Arizona), Willie Tuitama (Arizona), BJ Daniels (USF), Derek Thompson (North Texas), Andrew McNulty (North Texas)."

"Ever heard of any of those five guys? No? Well, you’re in luck – you didn’t have to watch BJ Daniels play."

"What’s brutal for Canales is nearly every team’s passing game trending upwards after he left. Tuitama completed just 56.6% of his passes under Canales, but 63.5% after his departure, including leading the then-Pac-10 in touchdowns the year after Canales left. Daniels was never good, but he went from completing 53.7% of his passes under Canales to 58.1% in the years following. North Texas’s passing offenses ranked 80th or worse in efficiency in five of Canales’ six years, bottoming out at 126th in 2015."

On addition of Canales to our staff:

"As with Charlton Warren, I talked to my friend Adam McClintock at CFB Matrix about a potential Canales hire. Few in football are better at creating realistic expectations for coaching hires/fires based on performance to talent level. The results I got back from McClintock are really ugly: 'I have Mike as a D- guy. His job results haven't been anything worthy of a job like Tennessee.'"

He went on to mention that there is no correlation to Canales and developing talent. Specifically stating that his most talented team was the 2009 USF Bulls and he vastly underperformed.


Fox Sports Knoxville must be a NegaVol :)
 
At some point, there will be 40,000 or so fans dressed like stadium seats and then they will not want mediocrity to remain any longer.

If I remember correctly, the Vols didn't slip more than 8th or so in attendance even under Dooley.

The fans will continue to show up unless there is a really long sustained stretch of losing records.
 
Weinke has told those around him that he wants the TN job, so I wouldn't say it's 100% Canales just yet, think Weinke at least wants a second interview. Canales has interviewed twice.
 
This offense was a joke for extended periods of time this season.

All the records were broken during a creampuff back half of the schedule, which still included 2 losses, one of which was largely caused by an awful offensive performance.

We play those same creampuffs every single year...

Breaking all time offensive records is not a laughing matter to me.
 
Other than recruiting, I don't see the advantage of a QB coach with NFL experience...specially in this type of system, which isn't the NFL norm. Give me an experienced college hand anyday.

I feel as if that's the point though. Yes coaching plays a part, but now more than ever college football is about the Jimmy's and the Joe's not the X's and the O's. Nothing in this guy's resume says he can recruit any position at an elite level. And please don't tell me "he just hasn't had the chance". He's been coaching for over 20 years I would think if he could do it he would have proven it by now.

I think he may just be fine at coaching up the QBs, but I just don't see him being able to win the recruiting battles that are needed if you want this program to be "elite"
 
I feel as if that's the point though. Yes coaching plays a part, but now more than ever college football is about the Jimmy's and the Joe's not the X's and the O's. Nothing in this guy's resume says he can recruit any position at an elite level. And please don't tell me "he just hasn't had the chance". He's been coaching for over 20 years I would think if he could do it he would have proven it by now.

I think he may just be fine at coaching up the QBs, but I just don't see him being able to win the recruiting battles that are needed if you want this program to be "elite"

We're just taking it on blind faith that Weinke can recruit at the college level. At least if he sucks, we'll give Butch a pass for trying something different. :wink2:
 
We're just taking it on blind faith that Weinke can recruit at the college level. At least if he sucks, we'll give Butch a pass for trying something different. :wink2:


I'm not really into faith... but I'd take blind faith over a terrible track record. That's what Canales has.
 
I never say something like this as I always try to be patient and see what happens, but this hire is a joke. Another buddy of Butch's that won't make it here.
 
Every time I look at his name my mind reads can anals

Sheds some light on you. :idea:
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I ain't the sharpest knife in the drawer so I have a few questions. How does no AD, a coach supposedly on the hot seat and no job guarantee past next Nov play into a coach accepting a job here?

Dave Hart is still working. He does not officially retire until June 30th 2017, though he won't actually be here nearly that long.
 
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So, given that I have not seen any formal announcement from UT, I guess this could go down in the category of fake news.
 
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